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About Michael J. Miller

Miller, who was editor-in-chief of PC Magazine from 1991 to 2005, authors this blog for PC Magazine to share his thoughts on PC-related products. No investment advice is offered in this blog. All duties are disclaimed. Miller works separately for a private investment firm which may at any time invest in companies whose products are discussed in this blog, and no disclosure of securities transactions will be made.

Nokia Plays Up Photo Improvements in Windows Phone 8-based Lumia 920

CEO Stephen Elop introduced Nokia's new flagship phone, the Lumia 920, today. He showed off the 4.5-inch phone with new features, including a better camera system called Pureview with optical image stabilization, as well as improved mapping, advanced display technology, and built-in wireless charging. "We are creating the most personal smartphone system," Elop said, and Lumia will be "the world's most innovative smart phone." The company has not announced specific dates or prices, but revealed the phones will be introduced in select markets in quarter four. (I wish we had more details, including carriers, but they weren't forthcoming.)

Even though Windows Phone 8 is obviously the big software change, both in the presentation and in later demos, the photo features of the Lumia 920 stood out most for me. Nokia Executive Vice President Jo Harlow said the 920 will offer better pictures and video than any other smartphone. Every day, people take 1.4 billion photos on smartphones, 368 million of which are posted to social networks, she said. IDC numbers predict that 2012 will be the first year that more photos will be taken on smartphones than on digital cameras. Harlow said that the big issue is that phones don't offer many controls and pictures are often blurry, particularly in low light. The Pureview sensor, however, captures five to ten times the amount of light in most phone cameras, with floating lens technology that captures more light and better pictures without flash. This also helps video.

Above: Nokia Executive Vice President Jo Harlow with Lumia 920

Nokia Senior Vice President Kevin Shields explained that the Pureview camera system allows a larger aperture, up to f2.0, and optical image stabilization, which lets the lens stay open a little longer by putting springs around the entire optical assembly. This is paired with post-processing on the image after it is captured, as filters are aware of how the lens moves. This is up to 50 percent more effective than the optical image stabilization of many high-end digital cameras, which steady the lens but not the entire camera assembly.

This is most noticeable in creating smooth videos, Shields said, but some very nice photos can be taken in low light without flash too. Later, he told me it is technically an 8.7 megapixel camera with an effective focal length of 26mm, but said that is "plenty" of pixels to take the kinds of photos you would take with a handheld camera.

Shields showed off two new "lenses" that plug into the Windows phone as part of the company's Smart Shoot application. One feature lets you remove unwanted things from your photo (like people in the way), while another called Cinemagraph lets you take a video and create what is essentially a still image with some motion video to it. Although these will be built into the 920, similar features will also be offered for existing Lumia cameras.

Above: A photo using the Cinemagraph feature. I'm shown waving, but my face and part of the background are still images.

Harlow noted that Nokia Maps, Drive, and Transport will also be included. On the 920, the location-based applications will be brought together in an integrated suite, including offline maps that work whether you are connected or not; indoor maps; and free, voice-guided turn-by-turn navigation with travel time estimates based on traffic. A new feature called City Lens is an augmented reality tool that lets you point your camera at a restaurant or other location and learn more about it. It also has an AR feature for maps that show points of interest while you are driving.

Other features include the company's PureMotion HD+, a display technology designed to provide blur-free scrolling and sunlight readability enhancements that improve the color and readability in bright sunlight.

The Nokia 920 is based on a Qualcomm S4 dual-core processor, which Harlow said is up to 30 percent more efficient than quad-core processors. It has a 2000mAh battery with built-in wireless charging (with chargers available from several partners, using the Qi wireless charging standard). The company said Virgin Atlantic, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, and others will be rolling out charging stations.

Microsoft Corporate Vice President Joe Belfiore recapped the Windows 8 platform, showing some new features related to cameras and photography. He added that the company is still saving some features for later announcements.

He talked about customizing the Start screen with smaller size tiles and configuring his Start screen so that personal information is at the top of the screen. It runs Windows Phone 7 applications and can be set to synchronize information with Windows 8 as well. Belfiore showed off the Pulse website in Internet Explorer 10 and discussed how touch-enabled HTML5 allows for resizing the website across Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8. He captured a screen shot (which wasn't built into Windows Phone 7), and then stored it on SkyDrive and shared it on Twitter as a demonstration.

Above: Microsoft Corporate Vice President Joe Belfiore

New features in photography include pinch and zoom within the camera application and a "lens" button that lets you apply controls to your photo. For instance, a Bing Vision lens can identify things like books and DVDs you see on the screen, Photosynth does panoramas, and a FX Suite lens application shows different effects (such as a negative version) that appear on screen as you are taking the photo. Belfiore emphasized how the built-in Photos application can automatically upload full-resolution photos to SkyDrive, including the lens, with the results showing up automatically in the Photos application on a Windows 8 machine. One interesting lens called Blink looks at series of images and chooses the best one, saving a modified picture that includes all of the photos.

The phones are available in bright yellow, blue, red, and even purple, and Shields noted that the new polycarbonate material of the design ensures the colors that won't wear off or interfere with the antennas. "This is a phone that exudes confidence," he said, as the construction is even sturdier and the glass is even harder than on a Nokia 900, which he said was good enough to use to hammer in nails.

The 4.5-inch, WXGA (768-by-1280) display is the fastest ever shipped with improved brightness, Shields said. Later, he explained that while typical mobile phone operating systems and screens are able to run at up to 60Hz, they are usually held back by other hardware elements. By adding RAM to the display itself, he said, Nokia is able to better buffer the images and drive the pixel transition up to 2.5 times faster than other phones.

He also talked about it having "super sensitive touch" and demonstrated running the phone and scrolling the display while wearing large red gloves.

Above: Nokia Senior Vice President Kevin Shields

Shields showed off wireless charging solutions, including JBL's PowerUp, which has wireless charging and NFC in a speaker system. You can play music on the speaker by just touching and charge the device on top of it. Headphones also work with NFC and a wireless charging night stand. Nokia Music, which should be available for Windows Phone now, works right out of the box with no sign up required.

In addition, the lower-end Lumia 820 has a 4.3-inch WVGA (480-by-800) display, with many of the same applications and exchangeable shells so you can change the color of your phone. Some of these shells also add wireless charging.

Elop discussed Nokia's strategy and the growing success of the Windows Phone platform, noting that there are now more than 100,000 apps for Windows Phone and that China is the largest market for Windows Phone.

Elop said that in addition to Windows Phone, Nokia is focused on creating mobile phones "for the next billion users," including ten new Asha devices with long battery life and compressed data plans. It will also work on future projects including improved antennas, optics, and location and commerce services. The Nokia location platform will be part of the Windows phone experience.

Nokia and Microsoft have been working together for 18 months, and Elop was joined on stage by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer.

Above: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Nokia CEO Stephen Elop

Ballmer said Windows Phone is "unlike any other phone on the market." The partnership with Nokia brings new features to the platform. "This is the year for Windows," Ballmer said, with technologies that are shared across a wide variety of devices. With Windows 8, the software is released and now we're beginning to see hardware, Ballmer noted. With Windows Phone 8, on the other hand, we're first seeing the hardware, especially with the launch today, and over the next month or two, we'll see the rest of the Windows Phone 8 software.

He talked about the shared features, including the user interface with Live Tiles on both the phone and Windows 8 PCs and tablets; Bing for search; the Microsoft account including SkyDrive; and Xbox services, including music, video, and games. More importantly, there will be a common developer platform and store for both Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8.

Ballmer predicted there will be close to 400 million new devices running the new UI within the next year, including the Lumia series, Microsoft Surface and many other notebooks and hybrids. He said this makes Windows the largest single opportunity available to software developers today and predicted the next app developer to hit it really big will be a developer on Windows.

In a later Q&A session, Elop wouldn't discuss future products and declined to address rumors that the company might do a tablet or a phone with a larger screen. He did say, however, that the company is on a journey with Windows Phone that will include other devices.

In demos, I got a chance to see many of the strong photo features and the mapping features (in which offline maps allowed for very fast zooming and scrolling). Photos taken at the event looked good, although I'd want to try it in more varied situations. The phones felt good in my hand and seemed quite solid.

Overall, I left a bit disappointed that we didn't hear more details about Windows Phone 8, pricing, or ship dates, but I was quite impressed by the hardware, particularly the camera features.

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